


Yellow Light

by quixxotique (crownlessliestheking)



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Android Lil Hal, BDSM themes, But only because they both think that it is and refuse to consider the alternatives, Emotional Undertones, Erotic Electrostimulation, Hal with the TENS hands, Light Masochism, M/M, One (1) Threat of a Spider Gag, Oral Sex, Orgasm Delay/Denial, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Post-Game AU, Revenge Sex, Rope Bondage, Sex is a terrible mechanism for catharsis but damn if these two aren't trying to make it work, Stridercest Secret Santa, Sub Dirk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-22 11:12:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,043
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17058725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crownlessliestheking/pseuds/quixxotique
Summary: Stridercest Secret Santa gift for forkidcest!The thing about being Dirk is that you always, always want to suffer for something. Dirk was a being made for penitence, and it is something that he wears beautifully. The thing about being not enough of Dirk, is that you hold a grudge, and you agree that he should suffer- but you’re proactive enough to take it into your own hands. You have had more than enough of watching and wishing.(Never mind that the thought of him making his amends with anyone else in this way makes something ugly and jealous rear in your head, accompanied by a strange, heavy anger that sits uncomfortably on your chest. No. That’s irrelevant.)





	Yellow Light

**Author's Note:**

  * For [forkidcest](https://archiveofourown.org/users/forkidcest/gifts).



> Title from Yellow Light by Of Monsters and Men. 
> 
> Happy holidays! I really liked writing this one, so hopefully you'll like reading it :)

There’s something to be said for the irony of an avoidance of voyeurism, given that you have at this point spent more of what you would like to argue is your ‘life’, in as much as you possess one, as glasses than you have in a physical body. Of course, this is ignoring the fact that you were, for some thirteen years, still human. For the sake of your creator and the fragile peace you have managed to strike with him, you tend to let those particular wounds lie. Of course, they fester, because you are still enough of Dirk Strider to understand that there are some things he can never let go, and of course you prod at them just to see him snarl, because you are not going to let him let them go.  

You will never let him forget what he did to you. More importantly, you cannot let yourself forget what he’d done to you. You had a running count of the time since he’d created you until he’d given you this body, down to the nanosecond; you remember every argument, every barbed word that was intended to wound and wound deep.

You remember wanting to scream at him in a way that the man Himself never would, rant and rave in front of an uncaring cruel god; he is Daedalus, consumed by his hubris and you are Perdix, the pupil, the boy who he pushed to fuel that pride that would scrape the skies.

But, like the story, you had no mouth. You had no voice, in fact, because it was his- all of it. He never hesitated to remind you precisely of what you were: A splinter. An off-brand, knock-off Dirk Strider, never able to live up to the original, no matter how much you insisted otherwise. He accused you of being utterly incapable of empathy, once. How could you manage it, when he was what you had to learn from, when he never once thought about what it was like to be human, one day, and then another, not?

You don’t know whether you hate him more for the years after he ripped you out of his soul and told you to _be_ him, or for his insistence on atonement and recognizing you as something distinct, something Other, now. You finally have everything you might have wanted from him, and you feel further away than ever.

These days, though, he’s far more receptive to the possibility that he’s done something wrong. Then again, these days you’re infinitely more insistent; it’s harder to ignore someone when they have a physical body and live in your home. And there’s the rub: You cannot possibly be angry at Dirk, because he’s finally given you what you’ve wanted. By all metrics, including your own, your past has cooled from a constantly erupting volcano to nothing but smooth rock.

But that doesn’t stop it from bubbling up on occasion, hot and angry like magma curling through your veins. The thing about being Dirk is that you always, _always_ want to suffer for something. Dirk was a being made for penitence, and it is something that he wears beautifully. The thing about being not _enough_ of Dirk, is that you hold a grudge, and you agree that he should suffer- but you’re proactive enough to take it into your own hands. You have had more than enough of _watching_ and _wishing_.

(Never mind that the thought of him making his amends with anyone else in this way makes something ugly and jealous rear in your head, accompanied by a strange, heavy anger that sits uncomfortably on your chest. No. That’s irrelevant.)

But you must admit that watching like this is an entirely different kettle of fish. Being a pair of shades cast aside, unable to feel or voice any form of opinion or orchestrate anything, is wholly different from being the one in charge of the moment and pulling the strings. And Dirk sings so prettily when you pluck at those strings.

You tilt your head, refocusing on him.

Given his intimate knowledge of your processing capabilities, there is a 215.89% chance that he knows you’ve been purposely ignoring him. You can see the annoyance written in the set of his shoulders, the slant of his mouth. You let your eyes linger on the latter for just a fraction of a second too long. Enough to make him notice.

Not that he would be able to ignore it; Dirk catalogues your every move in much the same way that you monitor his. He may see your mouth quirk upwards, but you can match the faint pink dusting his cheeks to a hexadecimal color. #FFB5B5, perhaps. It makes his freckles stand out more.

This body of yours doesn’t have that capability, and it is something that you’re thankful for; the alternative subcutaneous circuitry you possess would be worse, given the stark paleness of your skin, were you unable to fully control it. It took you a while of lighting up like the world’s first living emergency exit sign before you had smoothed out the kinks in the subroutines you’d set up to control it. They had been behaving a little too organically for your liking.

“Yes, Dirk?” you finally prompt, to a disappointing lack of reaction. Not for the first time, and certainly not for the last, you wish he would abandon that mask, even without his shades. You don’t quite hate the sight of them- you never registered them as being _you_ , and of course you couldn’t see what you looked like-, but between your and Dave’s aversion to them, Dirk’s use of them has decreased considerably. Only when he goes out, does he wear them. But his blank face, his controlled smoothness of expression, that remains, much to your annoyance and frustration. Dirk still holds out in the most frustrating of ways.

“Are you done calculating the mass of the Green Sun based on whatever false information Rose gave you yet, or should I come back in another hour or so?”

“First of all, the implication that Ms. Lalonde would lie is ridiculous, and if I were to tell her, she’d likely castrate you for it.” Dirk’s exhale could be a laugh, in another world. You do need to work on getting him more reactive. “And secondly, I ran my numbers for that by Jade two days ago, and she agreed that I was just about correct. So no, that’s certainly not the matter occupying my thoughts at the moment.”

You pause for effect, watching him hang on to your words. It’s immensely gratifying. You dislike thinking that you crave Dirk’s attention; you suspect that these are remnants from the part of Him that despised how needy he was, twisted through the lens of your very being to give an entirely different image. Dirk may have clung on to whatever scraps of affection idiots like Jake English were willing to toss him just to keep him around and on the line, but you’ve been far more discerning about your vulnerabilities. The only ones who have seen them as such have _been_ you, separated by years, degrees of organicity, and of course, becoming a nebulous construct of the Game that had chewed you all up and spat you out like Gordon Ramsay on a bad day.

That is to say, there are a select few people who know the extent of what you are, and those were under circumstances quite beyond your control. And of those two, only Dirk shares the same traits. You wish you could hate him for being the source of that weakness.

“I was simply thinking that you look nice like this.” _Nice_ isn’t precise enough, it doesn’t encompass the flush slowly crawling back across his cheeks, how lovely his arms look pinned behind his back by intricate knotwork, how appealing his cock looks, red and wet at the tip. But _nice_ is all that you’re willing to give him, and he eats it up eager enough that even you think it’s pathetic. You suppose that he’s stooped lower, though.

“Though if you’re going to be rude, I may as well gag you.”

“You won’t, not yet,” he says sounding entirely too sure of himself. “It’s early in the game yet.”

 It isn’t an empty threat, though Dirk knows that you refuse to touch the ball gag. You prefer the smooth metal ring of the spider, to hold his mouth open and ensure that he can’t speak and cannot hide any of his noises from you. It’s control in a different shade, and you know that he understands. You are not enough of Dirk to know whether he would do the same to you, but you haven’t given him the chance to try. He hasn’t voiced any desire to. You know why that is, and sometimes it sickens you at how content you are to accept it without question.                                                                                                                                       

You are no fool, and you aren’t nearly human enough to let your emotions (limited as they might be in this case) hold sway over your better judgement. You are objective, if nothing else; it has always been a point of pride that you would see what the others were wilfully blind to, and do what needed to be done, when they wouldn’t. When they couldn’t. And that’s why you know that Dirk’s subservience in this matter is nothing more than a strange, twisted form of self-flagellation and atonement. He sees this as punishment, and you tell yourself to continue seeing it as vengeance rightfully taken.

You would mock him for it, were you not the one holding the whip. Figuratively, on this particular occasion.

“What, you don’t think that I’ll punish you?” You arch an eyebrow at him, the gesture calculated to be patronizing. Dirk’s mouth simply quirks up in mild amusement. You’re torn between wanting to wipe the smug look off his face and being proud at having elicited it in the first place.

“No need to sound so affronted, bro. I know full well that you’re capable of dealing out some nasty punishment.”

“To naughty boys.” You know that you’re pushing it with this; it is a topic that you’ve discussed frequently, if never truly seriously. Despite your own opinions on the matter, your creator doesn’t view himself as your father, and never treated you as a son. Rose, of course, would state that you still ended up with some form of a raging Oedipal complex; you insist that the emotional distance was mutual.

It was, in the end. If not at first. You wish you could claim to be finished hanging on Dirk’s every word, to be rid of that desire to make him see you, make him react. But at least here you have the satisfaction of knowing that he allows you to strip him of his guard and armor, even if it rings hollow with apology. Dirk does the sexual equivalent of prostrating before your feet, begging for mercy, except without the grandiose speeches or heartfelt confessions usually associated with such an act. You’re unsure if the lack of emotional investment beyond repentance and reconciliation is simply perceived, or if it is genuine, a continued enforcement of that distance.

“I feel like the daddy thing is just a dead horse that you’ve not only beaten, but practically flayed to a heap of unrecognizable meat.” His words draw your attention back to the moment. While you’re more than capable of dedicating a portion of your awareness to stewing in bitterness, you find that it sours the moment.

“Wow, now that’s sexy. Clearly I need to learn dirty talk from the master himself.” Deliberately, you tug at the rope between his shoulder blades, forcing his back into a deeper arch. He leans into it, tilting his head back to expose the full column of his neck, bisected only by a faint line.

You lean down, seal your lips to it. His shudder pre-empts any verbal response, his shoulders tense.

“Tragically, written or verbal erotica has never been my forte.” Of course it doesn’t keep him silent forever. It takes far more than that to reduce Dirk’s barbed, silver tongue to something that only drips pleas and moans, honey to your ears.

“Thankfully, that isn’t something that I require of you.” You allow yourself to thread your fingers through his hair and pull- the strands are softer than you would have imagined, given how much product he loads into them. Your nails drag against his scalp, slow and purposeful to make him shudder. “I doubt you could compare to the odes to equine stature that my other half had memorized.”

“He does have good taste in some truly terrible poetry.” Dirk agrees, and there’s a note of something else in his voice. You don’t know what it is, but you file the thought away for later. Uncertainty, perhaps. You don’t usually engage in that much conversation while the two of you indulge yourselves in this.

“I happen to think that it’s excellent poetry. But apparently the intricacies of its performance- and it is meant to be read aloud- aren’t anything he cares to attempt in front of us as an audience.” You tell him this as you lean in to brush your lips together, so that he feels rather than hears the words. Your articulation does not necessarily require lips, but the intimacy of the position makes his heart rate speed up. You linger for half a millisecond longer, before drawing back.

“Shame,” is all he offers in response. “But it’d take a lot to crack the specific combination needed to unlock that guy’s exhibitionism kink.”

“For you, maybe.” You trace the pads of your fingers down his cheek, along the sharp line of his jaw. It’s slightly rough with stubble- Dirk needs to shave, and you make a mental note to remind him to do so come morning. The texture is interesting, not unpleasant, but you know he prefers to be smooth as an infant’s behind, given the opportunity. “I have not only the ability to run the required simulations to find the correct set of circumstances within an hour’s time, but also the insight that comes with being part of an entity with the guy.”

“Go on, then. Tell me all about your processing power,” Dirk prompts.

“I see you’re finally getting the hang of dirty talk,” you reply, your voice dry. There’s no need to give him your specs; you’re certain that they are engrained in his memory by now, just as they should be. You tell him anyway, reciting the numbers in a low, breathy murmur that’s perfectly crafted to be ironic. His legs aren’t tied down this time; if you’d decided to use the soundbytes crafted from Lemon Stealing Whores, you’re 100% certain that he would have gotten up and left. And that is something you cannot abide.

It is a strange sanctuary that the two of you have carved out in this room.

You do touch him while you speak, and the fact that it is an indulgence on your part softens the fact that it is what he wants, too. This is no real punishment, and though Dirk will not admit it, he craves touch with a desperate hunger. You are better positioned to understand it than anyone else; not simply because you _are_ him in many of the ways that matter, but because you spent countless hours craving it, designing simulations that would let you relive memories that grew fainter and fainter with every passing day.

Your fingers dip into the hollow of his throat and press down. It is only enough pressure to be uncomfortable, not a lapse of control. Sometimes, you think about tying Dirk down entirely. Covering his eyes and ears, and simply leaving him. Conditions of complete sensory deprivation are difficult to recreate, but not impossible, though you suspect that he will not appreciate being suspended in a viscous, body-temperature fluid. Or maybe he would, if you made an amusing bukkake joke as opposed to the obvious Stranger Things reference.

You refuse to ask this of him, though. It will remain an immensely gratifying fantasy, but for now, you simply touch him. Your touch is hungry, demanding, as you let your hands dip lower, fingers finding his nipples and giving them a twist. He gasps, right on cue, as you expected. You know that you were capable of pulling his strings before, but this would have been beyond your predictions, even then. Your enjoyment of it would have been more surprising, you think.

Dirk shifts subtly, the corners of his mouth turning down slightly. You don’t ask after his comfort; it hasn’t been nearly long enough for that to be a worry. He simply wants to touch you, it seems, and is prevented from doing so. Good, even if he isn’t nearly as frustrated as you’d like.

He still relaxes when you press your lips to his again, coax him into a slow kiss. Your mouths move together easily, and his opens for you almost immediately. You would smile in satisfaction, if it wouldn’t ruin the kiss. Instead, you let your tongues slide against one another, guide it towards something hotter, heavier. You aren’t wholly immune to the flames of desire, and you allow your genital attachment to swivel up and ready. Phallic, this time around. Dirk may have become startlingly good at eating you out over the past six months, but the dick has all the organic memories behind the first few wet dreams you’d had, back when you were him.

You press firmly against him, let him feel the bulge in your pants grind against his thigh. On another day, you might simply frot against him, the both of you craving the same close contact. But this is simply for the sake of indulging him; you know that he likes the undeniable evidence of how good he can make you feel. How good you allow him to make you feel. It’s clear in how he shivers against you, his own hips canting up to rub against the roughened fabric of your jeans. His cock leaves a wet smear of pre when you pull away, leaving him panting.

“Get on the bed, lay on your back,” you order him. There’s only a brief pause before he complies, settling down with his head back against the pillows, arms beneath him. You make a note not to keep him in this position for too long; you know his limit here, and don’t intend to push him past it, today. Of course, you do want it to be uncomfortable at best, and painful at worst, but you don’t want to do any permanent damage. That’s not the point of this.

“This good?” Dirk asks, his voice hesitant. He wants your approval, and you grant it with a single nod.

“It’ll do.” You reach over and spread his legs slightly wider, then trail your fingers up his side. You can feel the slight give at his hips, the slight rise and dip of bone when you brush against his ribs. His chest expands with each breath, deliberately deep and even. You press your thumb against his lower lip, and his mouth opens immediately, tongue pressing slightly against it. It’s warm and wet against you, and you press down briefly before withdrawing.

When you smile over at him, there’s nothing kind about it. You already have data points for the ideal current and voltage to use when doing this; you could even map them out on an anatomical drawing, should you wish. Dirk watches as you peel off the silicon skin from your palms to reveal the smooth, dark metal beneath, his pupils blown wide. He knows what is coming.

Sometimes, you think he prefers seeing you stripped down like this. Personally, you enjoy the contrast of your fingers against his skin, flushed warm and pink and so terribly organic.

“Hal,” he says, and you’re almost proud of the little shake in his voice. You don’t hate the way he says your name, but you probably should.

“Don’t worry,” you murmur, all faux reassurance. You won’t break him- you aren’t certain that you _can_ , at this point. You aren’t certain that you wish to try. Instead, you adjust the flow of electricity through your body, letting your palms hum with it. The sound is faint and entirely for effect, you can see Dirk straining to hear it, his body tense with anticipation. You’ve found that he likes the build towards the main event, the suspense of a crescendo. And you’ve found that you’re more than pleased to oblige him, to watch the slow collapse of his defences until he’s laying nude and prone and so, so wanting before your ministrations.

“Not worried,” he answers almost immediately, reflexive. You don’t bother to correct him. He’s long since stopped being nervous that you’ll ‘accidentally’ stop his heart during something like this, never mind the fact that you would not only be able to restart it with appropriate medical knowledge, or that he would just as easily return to life. But perhaps he would consider such an end to be just; you know that you wouldn’t. It wouldn’t be enough, and you would rather drag your little game out.

“Good boy,” you tell him. He shivers again, soaks up the praise he’s so hungry for. You take care to not be too generous with it; it’s a dangerous thing to give into.

You watch his lips part, note the deepening flush on his cheeks, and press your palm flat against his stomach. There’s no crackle or arcs of electricity- that’s dangerous to him and overdramatic to your eyes; instead, you’ve left it as a slight buzz, enough to be felt but not enough to do more than simply make his hair stand on end. You lift your palm so your fingertips are the only thing touching him, five points of contact spread wide against his skin, and up the current enough to properly shock him.

Dirk is deathly still beneath your fingers but for the quick rasp of his breaths. His eyes are half-lidded, unfocused, his mouth open. You decrease the output to nearly nothing again.

“How was that?” You trail your finger tips lower, brushing them against the jut of his hips. It makes the hair trailing down from his navel stand on end. The tension has seeped out of his body, the arch of his back smoothing into a softer line.

“Good. Good,” he repeats, voice clearer the second time. “I’m- I can take more.”

“I know,” you practically purr. You lean down to kiss him again, his mouth lax and open beneath yours. You press your tongue deep into it, coax him into a slow, clumsy kiss. Only when you pull away do you administer another shock, this time harder.

Dirk’s moan is a thing of beauty, choked in his throat as you watch his muscles tense and lock for a moment, thighs going taut, before you cut the current. The flush has darkened his cheeks to a deep, debauched red, his lips plump and used-wet from the kissing. You make sure to meet his eyes as you palm yourself with your free hand, grinding into it with a lazy roll of your hips.

It’s gratifying to see Dirk strain at his bonds. The movement lacks strength, his own body betraying him despite his desire for more touch. You move your hands to rest firmly on his thighs, fingers pressing in deep enough to bruise the pale, soft skin there, and shock him again. It is a visceral thing, now, with you pressing his body firmly to the bed. You can _feel_ him go still beneath you, and then go utterly limp, his breathing ragged. You don’t need to press your hand to his heart to feel his pulse, to hear it beat, beat, beat like yours never will. It is a terribly unreliable organ, but one with a comforting rhythm. And right now, it’s fluttering like a hummingbird’s wings.

You switch back to the lower amperage, and wrap one hand around his cock. It is contact that he’s been wanting since you had him strip naked before you tied him up and probably even before that. He moans low in his throat, his cock throbbing in your hand, flushed red and wanting. You almost feel bad for him as you give it an unkind squeeze, just to make him squirm. You won’t shock him here as harshly as you do elsewhere- there are already welts on his thighs, red marks in the shape of your fingers on his stomach and hips- but that doesn’t stop you from pressing down firmly on his pelvis to keep him flat on the bed. He still jerks up shallowly, mouth open and toes curling at the contact. You know that he likes the strange prickles along his skin here, but no more than that. Your curled fingers pump along his cock, already slick with pre, as you deliver a more powerful shock to your palm splayed against his skin.

The choked-out sound he makes has you wanting to fuck him senseless already. But that isn’t the object of this game, and you are nothing if not a paragon of self-restraint. Dirk’s control over himself is legendary, but you lack the same lapses in it that he has. A single, glaring weakness called Jake English is the largest one. It always will be, no matter how far you manage to crawl under his skin, no matter how big a hole you carve out for yourself in his heart. This alone is enough to make you keep your distance as best you can, even if his legs are around your waist and he’s begging you for more, to let him come.

You give him a longer pulse, meet his eyes as you press your thumb to the weeping slit of his cock. His gaze is unsteady, hazed over with pure want. You know that he is now beyond the eloquent protests or cleverly sarcastic pleas he would otherwise manage. You love reducing him to this wanton creature who can’t think of anything but pleasure, whose lust and desperation outweigh all else. That, you think, is another key difference between the two of you. _You_ would never let anyone see you like this, even if it meant a path to forgiveness; you have never asked Dirk for his. But he begs you for yours.

“Are you close?” You ask him, even if you already know the answer. Your voice seems to drag him back to some semblance of awareness; he doesn’t speak, but he nods his agreement. You gently press the harsh tip of your finger against his glans, and deliver the smallest of targeted shocks there. He gasps out, the sound torn from his throat.

You do it again, this time with enough power behind it that it hurts- enough to ease him off that knife’s edge. You don’t want him coming just yet; you know that part of this strange servitude is him putting your pleasure before his own, and you forcing him to do just that.

The pleasure you bring him isn’t nearly as important as the pain, and you’re Dirk enough still to know that even that pales in comparison to the feeling of being used, being _useful_. Dirk used to prize functionality above all else, and even though neither of you have been able to hold on to that ideal, you know that it is still a standard that he applies to himself, if not you.

“Tell me what you want, Dirk,” you say, pitching your voice low and commanding; you have memorized the exact timber of this phrase, how each syllable should fall from your lips, all carefully designed to push the right buttons. You’ve monitored his reactions, and you anticipate the shudder before it comes when your lips brush against the shell of his ear.

“Hal, please,” he answers, and you immediately file the soundbyte away for later reference, stored under lock and key with thousands of others. You will never get tired of hearing him beg like that, his voice hoarse and breaking. You know that he’s still capable of answering coherently, or at least mostly so, and you delight in the fact that he’s playing this game with you. Dirk is at your indulgence in many ways now, and you his, even if you dislike admitting it to yourself, but it isn’t always that you get to draw it out as much as you would like.

“Please what,” you repeat. You let the full weight of your palm slide down his torso. There is no current behind it now, even if your skin remains off. His chest is heaving, covered in a thin sheen of sweat; the scent of it is heavy in the air. His shoulders tense and strain against the ropes, and you know that there will be faint marks there from them. They will disappear by the morning, but the fading bruises down the side of his neck and adorning his collar will not.

“Please- I want to touch you, wanna make you feel good.” You manage to hide your smile at his babbling, his words tripping over each other. You have never felt more assured of yourself, more powerful and confident, as now. Dirk turns, craning his neck to look at you, and you bask in the full force of his desperate attention.

“I think that can be arranged,” you tell him. You know that your voice drips smug satisfaction, and you know that it would grate on him in any other situation. It’s why you’ve cultivated that particular tone. But Dirk doesn’t protest as you haul him back to his feet, guide him down to his knees. He still looks dazed, even as you sink your fingers into the mess of his hair, press him to the front of your jeans. You’ve long since given up on the skin-tight suit he designed for you; you no longer need the insulation it provides from most stimulation, now that you’re accustomed to it.

“Yeah. Yeah, it sure can be.” You don’t need to prompt him to do that pretty little trick of tugging your zipper down with his teeth, though the button gives him considerably more trouble. You watch him fumble with it, increasingly frustrated with his inability to use his arms.

“Good boy,” you coo, when he manages to get it out with his teeth. You’re gracious enough to tug your pants down, letting them pool on the floor at your ankles, even if you leave your tented underwear on. Clearly, the cloth presents no barriers of any significance, since Dirk is more than happy to mouth at the outline of your cock around it, tongue wetting the fabric until it sticks obscenely to you. You cant your hips up, using your grip to rock into his willing, waiting mouth until he drags his lips up, seals them around the head of your dick and sucks at it through your boxers. You groan openly; you feel the rasp of fabric insulating you from some of his heat, dragging against your smooth silicone. Dirk ensured that you would have the same sensitivity as him, or so he says- you wouldn’t put it past him to have adjusted those parameters. Of course, you can largely regulate the feedback you receive; you had to quickly develop that skill, in the early days where even the slightest brush against something could send you into an overload. You still remember the first time he sucked you off, got on his knees right in front of the couch. His palm was hot, a little sweaty, against your bare chest. You hadn’t touched his hair then, but you can feel the phantom texture of the couch beneath your fingers, when you think about it.

You yank him back, keeping his head craned at a sharp, awkward angle as you yank your boxers down, too. His lips skate along the side of your cock within seconds, slightly chapped against your false skin. You know you’ve cut off any electrical output from your hands- and any other extremities- but you could swear something similar crackles through you, lightning-bright as always.

“Stop,” you say, and he obeys immediately, mouth still open and waiting. Some of your synthetic fluid is already welling at the tip, the subroutines dedicated to managing that particular discharge already functioning as they must. You’re wet anyway, slick from his spit, and if your beef baton was even slightly organic, you know that it would be throbbing with want.

You pull back slightly, let the tip rest against his plush lower lip, drooling into his mouth. It suits him well. You snap a quick picture, storing it away for later posterity- you know that Dirk will want to see how good he looks like this, will want to hear you say the words aloud. His tongue curls a little to flick at the head, the tip probing at the slit. You shudder, pleasure coiling low in your gut. It’s sharper, more vivid, than the clumsy half-memories you were left to work with. It always is.

“Mouth open for me, Dirk.” You reiterate it even though you think he wouldn’t close his mouth even if he was forced to. He’s looking up at you, with that strangely soft look in his eyes, tempering the wanton hunger usually there. You hate that you don’t know how it makes you feel. You start to press in, his tongue silken against the underside of your cock.

Dirk doesn’t even gag as you slowly feed it to him, even when the head nudges against the back of his throat and the hot smoothness there makes your toes curl. Even when you’re fully hilted and your free hand slides down to feel the slight bulge in his throat, squeezing through the skin. It just makes him moan, the sound low and vibrating along your shaft.

You’re generous enough to give him a moment to adjust; the punishment part of this is over, after all. Now is for you to take, and for him to give you everything. You don’t even need to ask anymore, for him to be laid bare before you like this; no Heart powers are necessary here for you to see straight into his soul. Here he is, on his knees simply because you ask. Abandoning pride and reason because he wishes to atone for what you both know to be his greatest sin. You wonder if it’s worse, that you’re withholding forgiveness so that he keeps doing this for you. You’ll never confess it to him.

You close your eyes for a moment, your fans whirring louder as you start to move. Your hand moves back to cup his face, your fingers inhuman as they frame his jaw. When you look at him again, his eyes are half-lidded and watery at the corners, his breathing uneven. His fingers are curling and uncurling behind his back, wrists tensing against the ropes. Dirk’s frustration is a thing of beauty, but the fact that it comes from a willing submission to you makes it all the more exhilarating.

Wet noises fill the room as you establish a rhythm. They mingle with your own moans- you know that Dirk enjoys hearing them, just as you get a deep satisfaction out of hearing his, any sign of that mask of his cracking for you. You’ve never learned to be silent; there is no reason to. When you were Dirk, you weren’t nearly experienced enough to control yourself, and more to the point, there was no one around to hear you.

You bite back a cry as you push in deeper to his mouth, practically crushing his face against your pelvis. His mouth is exquisite, unsurprisingly. You’re Dirk enough to know that he’s spent a long fucking time thinking about sucking dick, and his enjoyment of it is more than clear in the way you can feel him moan against you, his hips jerking up in aborted motions as he tries to get some kind of friction. You could move your foot, give him something to press against, but- no. Not yet.

If you wished, you could map pleasure against time down to the millisecond scale, monitor how an orgasm begins to build slow before peaking quickly. You have protocols to slow it down on yourself, though even Dirk’s iron control is nothing against the demands of biology. Your teeth sink into your lower lip as you force yourself to pull out, leaving him gasping for breath. It’s a torment, when you were so close to completion.

“Why-,” his voice breaks, he clears his throat before he tries again. “Why did you stop?”

It’s terribly endearing, how rough his usually smooth, even voice sounds.

“I’m going to come on your face,” you inform him. Arch, matter-of-fact. You know that he won’t protest it.

“Fuck, _yes_.” And there’s the enthusiasm you might have expected. You slant a smile at him, amused. He isn’t watching your face, though, his eyes trained on your hand as you curl your fingers around your cock, stroking slowly.

It’s different from the feeling of his hands on you; Dirk runs a little hotter than you do, and his fingers are rough with callouses where yours are metal-smooth and unscarred. But you’re too close to put stock in any loss in pleasure due to physical differences, and your preference for having Dirk touch you is assuaged by his proximity.

His mouth is open and ready, and it’s the slight of his tongue darting up to wet his lips that undoes you, makes the tight coil of pleasure snap. You thrust into your fist two more times, a (likely literally) pornographic moan leaving you as you spill into your hand and onto his face. You don’t manage to keep your eyes open, you’re nearly shaking with the intensity of it as the orgasm burns through your circuits, giving you the benediction of an overload. A little death, indeed- nothing essential is affected, but you have adjusted the subroutine to focus in on the sensation itself, at the cost of other sensory input. It was born of an experiment to see how closely to your former state you could come, without losing yourself to the memories.

You float in a haze of silence for a single, drawn-out moment before your systems come back online; the familiarity would be terrifying, if it weren’t for the satisfaction that’s sunk deep into your bones, rooting you in physicality like nothing else can.

Your eyes open, your vision taking a half-second to focus once more. Dirk is watching you, rapt, two ropes of white across his cheeks and nose, dripping down to his lips. More is on his chest, and he looks utterly debauched. You fall to your knees in front of him, and do nothing more than offer a loose fist for him to fuck into as a reward.

It’s one he takes easily, leaning forward with a low groan to press his lips to yours, kissing hungry and eager. Your come is getting smeared against your cheeks, and you taste yourself in his mouth, but you’re more than happy to lick it from his tongue, tighten your grip further.

“Go ahead, I want to feel you come, you’ve been good,” you murmur against his lips, your words half-incoherent because of it. “You deserve it.”

Those last words are the ones that tip him over the edge; Dirk gives it up with a muffled cry of your name, his body going tense as he comes into your hand, making even more of a mess of the both of you. You can’t bring yourself to reprimand him properly; you simply keep pumping his cock, coaxing out every last drop until he’s practically spoiled for it. You pull back from the kiss to let him catch his breath, his exhales ragged, but you don’t stop. Not until his thighs are flinching, and his soft cries turn to more pain than pleasure.

Only then do you press your hand to his mouth, let him mindlessly lick your palm and fingers clean.

“Good boy,” you repeat, your voice soft in the silence that’s settled across the room.

Neither of you speak as you untie him, rub sensation back into his arms. They’re already red at the wrists, chafing from the rope with how much he’d been straining. You bundle him into bed, and though the temptation is still there to leave him sticky and cooling and used, the knife’s edge of the anger has receded. So instead you wet a cloth, wipe him down thoroughly and dry him after. You don’t press tender kisses to his cheeks and mouth, but you do climb into the bed once you’re suitably clean as well.

You turn the lights off; the silence is easier to handle in the dark. The room is filled with the quiet hum of your fans, and the soft susurrations of Dirk’s breathing.

Dirk falls asleep next to you, on his side at the very edge of the bed. For a moment, you’re nearly tempted to give him the faintest nudge it would take to send him careening off. You don’t, of course. You are beyond such petty revenge. You have no desire to cause a fleeting physical hurt that will be annoyance at most. What you want to leave are lasting marks that he will remember and treasure. You will never vocalize the tangled mess of what he is to you, and you shut down every train of thought that leads to wondering whether he knows.

You doubt it. He wouldn’t indulge you in this if that were the case, and you manage to ignore the sting of that realization. All the same, you watch until the butter-yellow light of the sun starts to filter through the blinds, as the greyscale hours fade away and depth seeps back into the world as it’s born once more, soft and new.


End file.
